


Making a Place at Your Side (The Lie Down with Wolves Remix)

by spuffyduds



Category: due South
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-23
Updated: 2011-04-23
Packaged: 2017-10-18 14:15:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,265
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/189736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spuffyduds/pseuds/spuffyduds
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ray's at Depot, training to be a Mountie.  He tells Fraser a lot of what goes on there--but not everything. And some of what Ray doesn't tell him has to do with wolves...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Making a Place at Your Side (The Lie Down with Wolves Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Luzula](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Luzula/gifts).
  * Inspired by [The Work of Coming Home](https://archiveofourown.org/works/94984) by [Luzula](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Luzula/pseuds/Luzula). 



> This is a remix of Luzula's wonderful Big Bang Fic, [The Work of Coming Home](http://archiveofourown.org/works/94984), which is slightly AU in that the Canada of this fic had legalized gay marriage at the time of Call of the Wild. But I also threw in elements from her lovely [Shapeshifter 'Verse](http://archiveofourown.org/series/764) series, in which Fraser is sometimes, unbeknownst to most, a wolf.

Ray doesn’t write to Fraser about everything.

He skips over the boring stuff, and (most of) the little complaints. Like, the food sucks, and even the little foam earplugs aren’t enough to drown out the snoring with fourteen guys in one room. (Those two things basically take care of themselves, anyway--after a few days he’s burning so many calories and he’s so fucking tired that he eats whatever’s put in front of him and he’s pretty sure he wouldn’t wake up at night if a train detoured through the dormitory.)

He writes that he misses Fraser. He doesn’t tell him that sometimes it sneaks up on him so fast and so hard that he almost doubles over, like he got punched in the gut. No need to worry the guy.

Ray’s going to be home soon, and he’s gonna be home with _prospects_ , with things opening up for him in Canada, with a way to stay here and stay _useful_.

He reminds himself of that a lot.

*******************************************

Three days in, they’re running one of the scenarios--this one’s crowd control at some kind of a riot. Ray’s kind of amused at first because he keeps trying to picture Fraser rioting--politest riot _ever_ \--but then the scenario-actor-guy right in front of him, the one he’s supposed to keep calmly telling to clear the streets and go home, suddenly calls him a goddamn Polack. Ray blinks, because what the hell, is that even a Canadian _thing_ , do they _say_ that in Canada? And then he gets it, right, right, they did this at the Academy too. They run some pretty serious insults by you to see if you’ll lose your temper, take a swing at a civilian.

“Please clear the streets and return to your home. Sir,” Ray says. Smiling.

“I’m not going anywhere, you fucking _faggot_ ,” the guy says, and Ray keeps smiling, because it’s part of the test, it’s totally random; well, maybe not, the “Polack” was personalized because of his name, maybe they actually went through their files to dig up what would sting the most, and he’s got “Benton Fraser” right there in black and white on the “spouse” line, maybe they--whatever, it doesn’t matter, he’s cool, he’s calm here.

And then the guy leans in his face and says, “Or maybe you’re a fucking _shifter_. Your mum a dog, boy?” and Ray feels like his spine catches fire. Like there’s a blowtorch up his back, but he snarls out, “Please. Return. To your home. Sir,” and he _keeps smiling_ , but he has a feeling his smile doesn’t look all that pleasant anymore because the guy blinks and backs away.

It’s funny when Ray thinks about it later; he was fine with the “faggot” thing, even though that applies to Fraser too, he was able to make that in his head be all about just him, just Ray, and shrug it off. The shifter thing, though, the thing that only applies to Fraser and not him at all, that almost made him lose it. Crazy.

He asks around a little, carefully, and apparently they called _everyone_ a faggot or a dyke, and a shifter. The more personal stuff was just what they could get from nametag or appearance. (One of the young cadets is seriously, seriously pissed off that they said something about his _freckles_. Kids, geez.)

So, yeah, that’s not going in a letter to Fraser.

*******************************************************************

He doesn’t write, either, about the thing with Jenkins. Jenkins is one of the youngest cadets, and one of the biggest dickweeds; Ray would bet serious money that just a few years back he was getting his jollies sticking other kids’ heads in the high-school toilets.

Ray can tell when the “gay” info actually gets around. He figured it would; Canada’s a big country, but the Depot is a small town. Eight days into training, there are suddenly funny looks from a few people, a couple of conversations that get cut off abruptly when he walks into the rec room. Jenkins, predictably, _doesn’t_ stop talking when Ray walks in, and Ray gets treated to a few seconds of “shouldn’t have to sleep in a room with him,” before he rolls his eyes and walks back out. Not like he’d put the moves on anyone here anyway--he’s here to work and, hello, he’s _married_ \--but it’s funny how the guys who are the most paranoid about their fucking _virtue_ in his presence are always the ones he wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot pole.

Ray heads back toward his room, but he keeps an ear out, and yeah, a couple or three someones coming up fast behind him. He turns a corner in the hall, stops and spins, and bingo, Jenkins and a couple of his associate dickweeds appear, blinking with surprise that he’s facing them.

Ray gives Jenkins first move, because it’s possible Jenkins just plans to say a few dumb things and walk off with his goons going hurr-hurr-hurr. Ray isn’t gonna be the one to escalate things; Ray is calm and sensible and _mature_. Relatively, anyway.

Jenkins, though--yeah, he says some dumb things but he says them while he’s stepping forward and grabbing Ray’s shirt with one big meaty fist and cocking his other fist back.

Jenkins has got probably seventy-five pounds on Ray, and several inches of reach, and he’s at least ten years younger, and in any kind of a fair fight he would decorate the walls with Ray.

Ray grew up dorky-looking, and small for his age until high school, and Polish, and poor, and in _Chicago_. Outside of the boxing ring, Ray has never had the slightest interest in a fight being fair. Outside of the ring, what Ray wants a fight to be is _over_.

So Jenkins does the big dramatic “I think I’m in an action movie and I’ll draw back my mighty manly fist really slowly” thing, and Ray kicks him in the balls.

Jenkins goes WHOOOOOOOOOF and doubles up, and Ray gets behind him and grabs his arm, yanks him back upright, spins him and shoves him against the wall. Pulls his arm up hard and when the two goons stop making stunned fish faces and step forward he says, “Any closer and I’ll break his arm,” and they stop.

Jenkins wheezes something about “Get you thrown out,” and Ray says, “Yeah, that’s right, you tell everybody the old fag beat you up, how’s that gonna work out for you?”

Jenkins sags, and Ray says, “You are gonna stay the hell away from me, is what you are gonna do. You are not gonna say one word to me again, ever, any of you, got it?”

They all nod really fast, and Ray lets go, steps back, still wary in case Jenkins is thinking about trying to continue doing stupid things, but Jenkins stays leaning against the wall.

“Glad we had this little chat,” Ray says, and it takes everything in him to turn his back on them and walk down the hall _slowly_ , but he does, and they don’t come after him.

Fraser isn’t gonna be hearing about that. Fraser would want to lodge a complaint and have it go through Official Channels. Ray’s way actually _works_ and doesn’t involve triplicate forms.

**********************************************************************

He does mention Carvel in his letters to Fraser, because Carvel’s a buddy, at least in that way where Ray’s--a vunkle. Avunchular? Uncle-ish. Carvel’s smart and a hard worker, and even though he’s in the bunk right next to Ray he doesn’t freak out over the gay thing. When they have any energy left at the end of a day they play ping-pong in the rec room. Carvel kind of reminds Ray of a baby Fraser, actually; quiet but loosens up (and gets competitive!) during ping-pong. Looks sorta like Fraser even, with the dark hair and blue/grey eyes and fair skin.

He seems to be dealing with Depot pretty well to start with, but around ten days in Ray gets a little worried about him; he's getting a little distracted and twitchy, and he goes from falling asleep as he hits the bunk, faster even than Ray does, to taking a long time to get to sleep and thrashing around a lot once he does. (And yeah, Ray stays awake for a while a couple of nights to check on that. Uncle and everything.)

Ray gives him some vague conversational openings, asking if everything’s going okay, how are things at home, the assholes here giving you any trouble? But Carvel doesn’t take ‘em, just says things are fine, and keeps being twitchy and irritable.

Ray doesn’t make the connection until he looks over at Carvel's bunk one night when the moonlight is practically noon-worthy. While the kid's thrashing in his sleep he’s making these little high-pitched whimpers, and he’s got his forearms pulled up to his chest. His hands are curled up and he’s moving them weirdly--all at once, no finger wiggles, like they were more of a solid single thing. Like they were _paws_.

Fraser does that, for a couple of nights around the full moon, when it gets really hard _not_ to change. And he gets a little twitchy and irritable in the daytime then. (Ray thinks of it as “pre-moonstrual syndrome.” He has not shared that with Fraser.)

Ray has a moment of “C’mon, what are the _odds_?” But he’s used to mostly trusting his hunches by now, and this just...feels right. And the idea of poor Carvel trying to tough this out by himself, trying to _not change_ while he’s suffering through Mountie boot camp--Ray’s gotta do something, here.

Ray climbs quietly out of bed and taps Carvel on the shoulder, and Carvel comes awake _snarling_. Yeah, good hunch, Ray.

“Waffala?” Ito in the next bed mumbles, and Ray says, “Back to sleep.”

“Kay,” Ito says, and snores.

“C’mon,” Ray says softly to Carvel, who’s stopped snarling and is just staring at him and shivering.

He walks to the bathroom, Carvel following him, and does a quick check for occupants when they get there. It’s clear, and he turns to look at Carvel and wonders how the hell to start this conversation.

“Uh, Kowalski,” Carvel says. “I’m not--I mean, you’re a great guy and everything, but I don’t swing that way.”

“Jesus,” Ray says, and has to put his face in his hands for a minute. “Not hitting on you, okay? I just--I think I know what’s going on with you here.”

“There’s nothing going on with me! I--it’s _stress_ ,” and oh, he is _so_ lying. Ray’s a thousand percent sure now.

“Look,” Ray says. “I got a good friend--from childhood--and, and _she’s_ got some uh. Changes going on. She can do the..thing...anytime she wants but it’s hard _not_ to when, uh, this time of the month.” And the “she” is because this is Fraser’s secret, not his--he’s pretty damn sure Carvel would keep his mouth shut but it’s not his decision to make. And goddamnit, Ray's also pretty sure he managed not to make any sense at all, there.

Carvel gets it though. Carvel looks at him and says, “You got it wrong, I’m not...” but then he just trails off and slides down the wall and sits on the bathroom floor, shivering.

“Don’t fight it,” Ray says. “No way you can deal with all the training they’re throwing at us if you’re fighting this too. Go. Run around. Howl. You need it.”

“I’ll be fine,” Carvel says.

“You will not, dumbass, you look like you’re coming off heroin or something. Go. Hide your clothes at the edge of the woods, don’t let yourself go under too deep so you don’t lose track of time, okay? Get back here before anybody’s up. Anybody happens to notice you’re gone, I’ll tell ‘em something vague about a girl in town.”

“I--god. Yes. Thank you,” Carvel says. He looks so pitifully relieved to have somebody around who _gets_ it that it’s all Ray can do not to pat his head.

He slips out, and Ray heads back to bed. He sleeps pretty fitfully, like he always does when Fraser’s out howling at the moon; Fraser’s smart and careful, but you never know.

Carvel gets back in at 4 a.m., though, and gives Ray a big relaxed goofy grin and faceplants onto his bunk and starts snoring in about 1.5 seconds, and Ray rolls over planning to do the same. His head has too much going on in it, though. He’s not going to tell Fraser about this until after graduation; too complicated, he’s got to get permission from Carvel _and_ permission from Fraser to talk about it. But after that...Ray’s trying real hard here to make it so Fraser and him can be partners again, real partners at work as well as at home. But Fraser’s been so alone with the other side of himself practically his whole life, that side he can’t tell hardly anybody about. Friendship with Carvel might be something else Ray can give Fraser--somebody to talk with about his moonlit side. Hell, maybe Carvel’s got a whole pack of shifters he can introduce Fraser to, who knows--a big Vecchio-sized family of sometimes-wolves.

Ray snorts into his pillow at the image of a dozen wolves arguing at the dinner table. Yeah, something to bring up with Frase, definitely. But not right after graduation.

Right after graduation? Ray’s going to fuck Fraser through the mattress.

 

\---END---


End file.
